There is Naif Al-Mutawa, a Kuwaiti businessman and father of five who fights for truth, justice, and the Islamic way via his superheroic comic creations, The 99.

The Malaysian government has deemed the banned books “religiously deviant,” saying they “contain elements which could confuse Muslims and cause moral harm.” While Faisal doesn’t deny the existence of Shia elements in his works, his intention is to highlight his support for freedom of religion and his opposition of institutionalized Islam in Malaysia.

“I have positioned myself ideologically against the Malaysian government’s ‘Islamism’ project and by challenging the status quo, even a known writer like me can get into trouble” he said.

However, from being the poster child of Malay literature, Faisal soon fell from grace with the Malaysian government when he branched out into a subject matter considered taboo in the country — Shia Islam.

Six of his works, five novels and a play, which delve into the topic, remain banned in the Sunni Muslim country.

He asks them to go beyond just telling stories and also offer solutions.

“Indeed, literature places crisis at the center, highlighting violations, publicizing the issue, and we as writers need to go beyond,” he said.Even his works that are banned are hard to find on bookshelves like his novel, Bagaimana Anyss Naik Ke Langit (How Anyss Goes to the Sky), focused on the plight of the Penan Indigenous group in Sarawak.“This commercial censorship proves that fear is creeping in effectively,” he said.However, Faisal highlights that this does not mean that his recent works are a rejection of Western ideas or rejection of Islam, but positions them as a “bridge between these two poles.” “I believe this is a correct formula,” he said. Careful readers of this space might object that we say this every issue. Over the past year we’ve been trying to revisit a lot of our assumptions about what a Middle Eastern art and culture magazine should be.And there is the late Nader Khalili, an architect inspired by Rumi to create the perfect habitat for impoverished humanity.